Supermicro mobo or alternative with IPMI

[adrenalkrysis]

Hey there guys

 

I have started gathering parts for my unraid build however the only component I am not 100% set on so far is the motherboard.

 

I am currently looking at the Supermicro X10SL7-F Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard to pair with my Xeon E3-1231v3 but given the price/possible overkill wanted to check if there were any alternative recommendations to this board.

 

IPMI is a requirement as I want to run it headless and I need enough SATA ports for 6 drives + cache with possibility to handle a total of 12 drives if I end up filling my Node 804.

 

With the SAS ports of the x10SL7-F I would have more ports than I need however the only other supermicro I could find in Australia was the Supermicro X10SLM-F-O which only has a total of 6 SATA ports.

 

If anyone has any suggestions I would be happy to hear them even if it is to convince me that the X10SL7-F is the option I should go with so I can be confident before I make the investment.

 

Thanks in advance,

James

[danioj]

You will NOT go wrong with the X10SL7-F. I have it and am wonderfully happy with it. Everything you want nothin you don't want. Perfect unRAID M/B.

 

I couldn't recommend it more. Especially if you like IPMI (with dedicated LAN), Multiple LAN Ports, 14 SATA ports (controllers work off out of box config), expansion slots for (more SATA ports) if you need them (which if you consider buying the new 8TB Seagate Drives like I do - which are also perfect IMHO for unRAID - you probably will NEVER have need for SATA expansion) excellent build quality .... what more do you want?

 

Choosing this M/B was the best decision of my Build. See link to my Build Thread with more detailed discussion in my sig.

 

 

[JonathanM]

You will NOT go wrong with the X10SL7-F. I have it and am wonderfully happy with it. Everything you want nothin you don't want. Perfect unRAID M/B.

I also use this board and mostly concur. The only thing this combo lacks is something you can't get without spending hundreds of dollars extra. The E3 Xeon processors lack the ability to adequately split out devices for independent passthrough without software hackery. So, if you want to have multiple simultaneous VM's all running their own video card, you will want to upgrade to an E5.

 

The E3 and X10SL7-F is perfect for any other use case I've run into right now. You can always use the extra SATA ports with SSD's mounted creatively inside the case.

[tdallen]

The ASRock Rack motherboards are the common, slightly cheaper alternative to Supermicro.

[danioj]

... The E3 Xeon processors lack the ability to adequately split out devices for independent passthrough without software hackery. So, if you want to have multiple simultaneous VM's all running their own video card, you will want to upgrade to an E5

 

Really? I've tried a quick search and can't find anything on this. Do you have any references?

[JonathanM]

... The E3 Xeon processors lack the ability to adequately split out devices for independent passthrough without software hackery. So, if you want to have multiple simultaneous VM's all running their own video card, you will want to upgrade to an E5

 

Really? I've tried a quick search and can't find anything on this. Do you have any references?

Here is a thread referencing the issue, it should give you search terms to allow you research further.

https://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=45972.0

[adrenalkrysis]

Thank you both for confirming that the supermicro is a solid choice, I knew it was I just have a habit of getting carried away and going far beyond my needs! Haha

I haven't planned much in the way of VMs for my server but that may change as I learn more however the E3 should serve my planned usage of plex transcoding, media server, sab, sonarr, cp, hesdphones etc quite well.

 

As for the AsRock Rack mobos I did look for those but haven't had much luck sourcing them in Australia